Hanoi (VNA) – Withgood performance in the COVID-19 combat, central Da Nang city and itsneighbouring province of Quang Nam are seeking permission to welcomeinternational tourists back.

Lao dong (Labour) newspapercited Chairman of the Da Nang People’s Committee Le Trung Chinh as saying thatthe city has managed to put the latest coronavirus outbreak under control andcurrently ranks eighth among the 63 provinces and cities in terms of thevaccine coverage, with 95 percent of its population aged 18 and above alreadygetting the first dose and 15 percent, the second.

In particular, the city hasexperience in concurrently receiving people from abroad and ensuring pandemicprevention and control, he noted.

Da Nang is a tourism hub ofthe entire central and Central Highlands regions, but its tourism industry hasbeen hit hard by the pandemic for the past almost two years. While 90 percentof travel companies have had to shut down temporarily, 80 percent or 42,000people directly working in this sector, and hundreds of thousands of indirectworkers have become idle. The tourism and service sectors, accounting for 64.3percent of the local economy, have shrunk continually.

Given this, the municipalPeople’s Committee has proposed the Prime Minister permit the city welcomeforeign visitors back from November.

It expects this move willhelp Da Nang gradually recover tourism and achieve the “twin targets” offighting COVID-19 and boosting socio-economic development. Tourism recovery isalso hoped to fuel other sectors like transport, industry, trade, construction,and real estate while keeping the city attractive to travellers when otherdestinations around the world are also reopening.

Local authorities asked forpermission to serve foreign visitors in package tours or tour combos and hopedto receive 15,000 - 20,000 arrivals per month.

Like Da Nang, Quang Namprovince has also submitted a similar proposal to the PM.

It has received about 15,000Vietnamese citizens returning home from abroad since the start of this year.Local accommodation facilities and travel and transport companies have done agood job in serving returnees and ensuring pandemic prevention and control.

This reflects the province’sreadiness to welcome international travellers in the time ahead, according toLao dong.

To ensure effectiveness oftourism reopening, Nguyen Xuan Ha from Gami Theme Park Management JSCrecommended authorities issue consistent regulations on transport and travelamong localities and step up vaccinations for tourism workers.

He also suggested priority begiven to international visitors with vaccination certificates, especially thosefrom Southeast Asian countries.

Phan Xuan Thanh, Chairman ofthe Quang Nam Tourism Association, said businesses are ready to take actions assoon as the administration gives the green light, but authorities should workto lower interest rates of bank loans and create new capital sources forenterprises to soon reactivate their operations./.